Learning Curve
by element78
Summary: They're six seriously screwed-up people who all have something to learn. Unfortunately, the only ones they have to learn from are each other.
1. Tony

A/N: Because they all have things to learn.

This will eventually have six chapters, one per character. Sometimes what is being taught is fairly obvious, sometimes it isn't.

* * *

_A man who is a master of patience is master of everything else. - George Savile_

* * *

"No_._ Now put that down before you kill someone."

"Or someone kills me?" Tony asks. He gets a dark look in response and puts the gun down. "Sorry, you're right, bad taste. It's just, I would feel much safer if I had, at least, a passing familiarity with guns."

"Really?" Clint drawls, not so much forgiving the kill comment as moving on from it. "You'd be the only one."

"I could ask someone else, if that's the problem," Tony offers. "I just thought, you know, master sniper… But if you're not up to it, I understand."

"That hasn't worked on me since I was seven."

"I'm insulting you, aren't I?" the billionaire barrels on, changing tactics effortlessly. "This is demeaning, or something. It's like asking the chef of a five-star restaurant to teach some high school dropout how to operate the fryer at McDonald's. Is that it?"

"Why is 'no' such a difficult concept for you to understand?" Clint counters. "You hear it often enough."

"Do not."

Clint gives him a droll look, then smirks. " 'Hey, Steve, can I borrow your shield? I wanna hook it up to the amplifier in the surround sound system and see if we can blow out the neighbor's windows.'"

"In my own defense, I was a little drunk," Tony begins. Clint lifts his voice to talk over him.

"'Hey, Bruce, wanna go to Lollapalooza?'"

"All right, a lot drunk, but I'm trying to-"

" 'Hey, Thor, will you test this? I'd do it, but I'm afraid it's gonna blow up.'"

"- get you bunch of tightwads to loosen up, am I the only one around here-"

" 'Hey Natasha, I know it was just part of your cover at Stark Enterprises, but have you ever given any serious thought to doing model work?'"

"-who knows how to relax and have a good time and just _enjoy myself_?"

Silence descends, their last words echoing around the shooting range as they eye each other. After a moment Tony shrugs and glances away.

"Technically, I never actually heard anyone say no that last time."

"Maybe not, but you were walking funny for three days," Clint says mildly. Tony takes a moment to study him- he and Natasha have been working together for years, no way you'll convince Tony that Clint hasn't, at some point or another, been introduced to Natasha's unique way of saying 'no'.

Tony considers the conversation thus far and decides to go for broke. "Hey, Clint, will you teach me how to use a gun?"

"No."

"Boring," Tony says instantly. "And surprisingly unoriginal. Everyone else always says no- or hits me, which by the way is not a suggestion- and now here you are, doing the same thing. I'm surprised, Clint. I expected better of you."

Clint doesn't say anything. He doesn't really need to. Tony is perfectly capable of holding a conversation entirely by himself. The other people in the room aren't really participants so much as his audience.

"I didn't think snipers were followers," Tony plows on. "I thought you all had that lone wolf thing going on. But I see you're really just part of the herd."

"Pack."

"_Whatever. _Look, if you don't want to do it, I'll just get…. I'll get…" And here Tony flounders, trying desperately to think of someone who both can use a gun and would be willing to teach him. He has already gone through the list once, which led him to Clint to begin with. He doesn't really fall into both categories, but he fits the first one and the third, unspoken requirement- conveniently located- and Tony had figured that with enough effort he could antagonize the sniper into fitting into the second category if for no other reason than because it would be the only way to get Tony to _leave him alone_. Except Clint has turned out to have considerably more patience than Tony anticipated- another sniper trait, he really should have expected that- and now the person on the verge of losing it is Tony.

"Steve!" he says, yells really, feeling triumphant. "I'll ask Steve. He'll show me."

Clint folds his arms over his chest and raises his eyebrows expectantly. There is the almost audible sound of a bluff being called.

Tony jerks his chin up, gives the marksman his patented I-am-superior-to-you-in-every-way look, and heads to the door. He stops a step away. "Okay, you got me. I can't ask Steve."

He'd had too much fun mocking the soldier when Steve had first offered to show him how to use a gun, first on the various ways 'use a gun' could be taken as, given modern slang, and then expounding on why Iron Man did not need some puny little peashooter. And Steve would still show him, if Tony asks, but he'd have that smug _look_ on his face the whole time, and then Tony would have to hit him and would most likely succeed only in breaking his hand.

Finally, he tries one last time, taking a tact he hasn't before. The word feels like a stone in his throat, and he drags it out with extreme reluctance. "Please?"

He can't actually look at Clint as he says it, so all he hears is the soft sounds of movement. "All right."

"All- what? _All right_? That's all it took?" he demands incredulously.

"Yup. Should've tried that first." Clint moves over to the gun and spins it idly, catching it by the grip and picking it up. With an almost lazy casualness he picks out the target at the other end of the range and puts twelve neat little holes in it.

"Can you do the thing where you spin it?" Tony asks, making a looping gesture with one hand, once he's absolutely sure there are no bullets left. Clint ignores him, which is honestly the best he could have hoped for.

"First thing," he says casually. "Everything you've ever seen on TV or in a movie is wrong."

"Huh," Tony replies. He'd figured as much.

"Second thing," Clint continues, "I learned how to shoot in the Army." He reloads the gun with quick, precise movements, and Tony knows just by watching him that he's done it a thousand times before, can probably do it in the dark by feel, even in his sleep by rote.

"And?" Tony prompts, when it seems like that's all he's going to say.

"And they're not exactly known for being the most patient teachers," Clint finishes. He aims the gun down the range for a moment, then steps back and offers it to Tony, along with the least friendly smile the billionaire has ever seen. "Your turn."

"Oh, good," Tony says, and takes the gun.

It's probably far too late to run.

* * *

"Hey, Tony," Steve says as the billionaire walks into the den. The TV is running on the twenty-four-seven news channel but the soldier's focus is on the sketch pad in his lap.

"So I have an idea," Tony says without preamble. If he plays this just right, he can get Steve to okay this without actually knowing what he's agreed to until it's far too late to do anything about it. "Team building and all that jazz."

"Saving the world together wasn't a good enough team builder?" Steve asks, sounding amused. Not suspicious, at least not yet, which really just proves how much he underestimates Tony.

"Fine, a field training exercise or whatever," he says dismissively, waving a hand as if to shoo away a fly. Steve finally looks up at him, frowns a little.

"Are you all right?" he asks.

"All right, perfectly. Yes." Tony forces himself to stop rubbing his shoulder- _don't lock your elbow or you'll be able to bend your arm in more places than normal_, but funny how he didn't mention that taking the recoil properly left your shoulder feeling like Thor had given you a good wallop-and sticks his hands in his pockets.

He's never going to be anything better than just decent with a gun- Clint's assessment ran something along the lines of 'you'll do, but if you ever point a gun in my general direction, it will take a team of surgeons eight hours to find it again'- but it's better than nothing. And as a bonus, he has a much more thorough appreciation of Clint's skills, which is what prompted this idea.

"Okay," Steve says carefully, in his humoring-the-madman voice. He gets to use that one a lot around here. "So what's your idea, then?"

Tony bites back his grin. If he grins, it will be his Mad Scientist grin, and Steve will say no before he can even ask.

"Have you ever heard of laser tag?"


	2. Natasha

A/N: Second one. There's a sort of all-over theme running through these, so they're in the order they're in for a reason. I didn't mean to put two Tony chapters so close to each other.

This one isn't as funny, but Natasha is simply a harder character to write for, especially in terms of humor. Even Tony is a little more mellow than normal, but I had more in mind the scene with Bruce in the lab, where they're talking about the Hulk and Tony's ARC reactor. He is capable of behaving maturely, if only for a short time.

* * *

_To relax, I work.- Christopher Lambert_

* * *

She's in the last hours of some twenty-four hour stomach bug when they get the call-out and Rogers gently but firmly tells her she can't go. She wants to argue but won't tell him _why_ this is so important- won't even admit it to herself, won't put words to what feels so much like betrayal- but he figures it out anyways. It's not the first time the team has split up, but it is the first time since the Avengers began that the pair has split up, and the last time they had separate assignments Natasha almost didn't get Clint back.

Rogers very solemnly promises he'll watch out for them. Thor says something similar. It's Clint's exaggerated annoyance, however, that convinces her all will be well. Clint may be only human, and in the company of supersoldiers and demigods, but he's the one she'd trust most to have her back even if she'd met him only last week. Clint _watches_, that's what he's best at, far better at watching his teammates' backs than they are at watching their own, and he looks mildly insulted that these two frontline grunts think they can horn in on his turf.

"We'll be fine," he says as he's heading out. He doesn't say _I'll be fine_, because it's not about just them anymore.

Bruce also hesitates on the way out, but unlike the others, he makes no promises. Instead he glances over Natasha's shoulder, down the hallway to the room from which ACDC is blaring loud enough that even out here they're practically shouting at each other.

"Good luck," he says dryly, and it takes all of Natasha's self-control to not throw herself after the men and beg them to take her with them.

* * *

If asked, Stark would maintain that he's been grounded because he was forced to take drastic measures to defend himself when one of his supposed teammates viciously betrayed him. At least, that's what he said to Natasha when the boys got back from their little 'team bonding' laser tag exercise, Stark with his arm in a sling. Rogers had been in a slightly better frame of mind and so explained that, at some point during their second game, Clint had gone rogue.

Clint hadn't bothered to explain himself. He just handed her the computer printout showing his shots-fired-to-kills ratio- somewhere in the neighborhood of ninety-five percent- and walked away whistling.

* * *

"Oh, wow."

Natasha doesn't look up, keeping her focus on the gun she's cleaning, as if the task requires any serious amount of concentration. She's pulled out her weapons for basic maintenance. "Go away, Stark," she says.

"Tell me, little girl, what is it _you_ want for Christmas?" Stark pushes on, continuing into the room. "Another instrument of pain and death? But where would you put it?" He nudges one of her electric bracelets with a socked foot. "I thought we had a rule about weapons in the house."

She puts down the gun barrel, picks up the bottle of Tums she's been keeping nearby. Every time she feels a little off, she pops a couple, figuring that it's impossible to overdose on something that is essentially flavored chalk.

"Is this what you do on your down time? Because if it is, I'd hate to see what your idea of vacation is like," the man persists. Clearly he couldn't take a hint if he was whacked over the head with it.

"Did you need something?" Natasha asks, looking up at him for the first time. For a moment it looks like some smartass answer is on its way, but Stark pauses, looks at the ring of weapons around her, and for once takes the discretional route.

"Stir fry," he says. She frowns at him.

"You want stir fry?"

"I was going to make- it won't bother you, right? The smell?" He doesn't give her a chance to answer, just plows ahead in typical Tony Stark, Steamroller fashion. "I'm making stir fry. Want some?"

"You can cook?" she asks carefully. The kitchen is something of a sensitive subject among the six of them, with their various levels of incompetence. Clint's pretty good, and used to cook for her sometimes, but he's unusually shy about this ability and she hasn't seen him set foot in the kitchen since Loki.

"Well, I won't blow up the microwave," he says, which is a slight exaggeration- Rogers only blew it out, not up. "It's stir fry. You put it in a pan, you stir it, you fry it. How hard can it be?"

She watches him go, considers the question. It doesn't sound hard, but nothing does when phrased just so, and she's learned not to take even the most basic things for granted. Microwaves are a post WWII-era invention, or so Jarvis had informed her while she and Rogers had been looking for the fire extinguisher, so naturally at least one person in the house wouldn't know how to use it. And what Thor knows of anything is anyone's guess.

So she follows him, mostly out of the morbid fascination that causes people to gawk at train wrecks.

As it turns out, his secret is to cheat- he gets a bag of frozen pre-made stir fry out of the freezer and dumps it into a pan with oil, then positions himself by the stove with a spoon. Natasha stays in the doorway, watching silently, and crunches another couple Tums when the smell threatens to turn her stomach.

"You know," Stark says suddenly, eyes still on the pan, "when I first started doing the Iron Man thing, right after Gulmira," and there's a pause and the tiniest hitch that indicates that's still sensitive territory, so she keeps quiet, "Pepper tried to quit."

He picks out a peapod and tosses it into his mouth, and Natasha says nothing. He doesn't seem to want input and she has no idea where he's going with this.

"She thought I was going to get myself killed, or worse," he says, and smiles darkly at the idea. "She wouldn't be part of that."

"You're think I'm obsessed," Natasha hazards, knowing as she says it she's wrong.

"When was the last time you took a vacation?" Stark asks, evading. "A real vacation, not a working vacation."

"Three years ago. Greece." She adds the last part before he can ask, and remembers white sand and crystal-blue water, a private beach because she wasn't comfortable among the crowds, didn't belong with them. She would have left after the first night if she'd been there alone, but Clint had been on sick leave after taking a bullet to the gut and she'd been his assigned babysitter. He'd been determined to ignore her gloomy, looming presence and enjoy himself, and somehow he'd managed to sucker her into relaxing. She can pretend that it was a real vacation, if she ignores the memory of the barely-healed wound and the occasional pained cringes.

"Steve's got his drawing, Thor's got his _Stranger From a Strange Land_ thing, Bruce and I have our work," Stark continues, focusing on the pan so intensely now she's surprised it hasn't spontaneously combusted. "You and bird boy don't have hobbies that I've seen, apart from killing things, and a hobby stops being a hobby when it becomes your day job."

He looks at her now, finally, and uses the spoon to pick out another peapod and offers it to her. "I'm done. Want some?"

Natasha moves past him, gets a pot off the rack and puts it on the stove. A moment later she puts the box of instant rice on the counter.

"Figure a genius can handle making rice," she says, moving back to the doorway. "Let me know when it's done."

She finds Rogers' sketchbook on an end table in the den and flips through it on the belief that if he didn't want it seen he should know better than to leave it lying around. Then she puts her weapons away and sits on the couch as Stark bustles around in the kitchen and swears when the sizzling oil burns him, and she thinks about Greece.

She doesn't eat the stir fry, only rice with a dash of soy sauce, but her stomach doesn't rebel. Stark complains about the food and sucks at his burned wrist and steals the sketchbook so he can write some brilliant epiphany in the corner of a page- "Cap'll forgive me, he always does"- and generally makes her regret she put all her guns away.

"You want something that doesn't come out of a bag in the freezer someday, ask Clint," she tells him, thinking of Gulmira as she does so. It's the best she has to offer.

Stark looks at her, dark eyes far too knowing, and she remembers there's a genius in there somewhere, beyond the flamboyant exterior. "I will," is all he says.

Then he goes back to his lab, and Natasha settles onto the couch and turns on the TV to look for something worth watching, and doesn't even consider going to bed until the boys get back.


	3. Thor

A/N: I have to admit, this chapter is where this story first came from. I can't help but imagine Thor driving like some sort of stunt driver on crack. Thor is fun to write for, and doesn't get nearly enough love. Or respect as something other than a warrior.

* * *

_Auto racing is boring except when a car is going at least 172 miles per hour upside down. -Dave Barry_

* * *

It is not, in the truth of it, that Thor is stupid. Quite to the contrary, his people are far more advanced than the Midgardians. The problem comes in that Thor is more of the warrior class, a fighter rather than a thinker. And anyone would look a fool in a world filled with alien technology.

In that manner he finds a certain solidarity in Steve, who slept in his prison of ice through the technological revolution and woke to a world that is as foreign to him as it is to Thor. At least to the Asgardian this place is truly alien; to the captain, it was once home, now twisted and warped and changed almost beyond recognition.

Some things, however, had not changed at all, or at least not nearly enough, which is how Thor found himself in a large, empty lot with this metal beast before him.

"I do not feel comfortable in these... _vehicles_," he says. 'Vehicles' sounds like a false word, like something the Iron Man would tell him as jest. He's accepted that his fellow Avengers will see him as no others ever have, fumbling around like some inept, clumsy child, but at least any jokes on his behalf are all done only in good humor.

"I asked Clint to teach Stark and Natasha how to fly the SHIELD planes," Steve says. "And a helicopter, and whatever else he can fly. Apparently there's quite a list." He looks at Thor. "All you have to do is learn how to drive."

When phrased so, Thor supposes he can find it in himself to learn. He moves forward reluctantly, eyeing the vehicle warily. He knows little of these things aside from what wondrous weapons they make, both for hitting people- Jane insists both times were accidents, but that didn't stop it hurting- and as explosives. Horses don't explode like that, he thinks like a sulky child, then chases the thought away.

He takes the keys- and that in itself had been a lesson, that little chips of metal and plastic can be a key- and moves over to the thing. Stark had called it an ess-yu-vee, which apparently means it is one of the larger, box-like types. Carefully, because he is so much stronger than any human, Thor opens the door and looks inside, at the seat and the odd wheel, then looks up over the roof of the 'vehicle' to meet the captain's eyes.

Apparently past the point of negotiation and patient logic, the man points at the door and uses a stern tone. "Get in."

When he's seated- and after a lesson on how to adjust the position of the seat, so he has the room to sit- he looks at the wheel, then the display to his right. He half-expects the thing to start speaking to him, as the house does.

"Well, it's Stark, so we know we've got all the fun toys," Steve says wryly, following Thor's gaze.

"Do you know what they are?" Thor asks.

"Radio," comes the prompt answer. "The air control thing. A clock."

There's a brief silence as they both look at the console. There are a good deal more than three buttons there.

"And a bunch of other stuff you don't actually need to drive a car," the captain rallies. "Put the key in that slot there and turn it."

Thor does as he is told, then sits and waits. After a moment Steve, taking care with his words, says, "Turn it and hold it there until the engine starts, then letgosoyoudon't-" His words come out faster at the end until he's almost yelling. The engine gives a horrible, scratchy screech and Thor releases the key, yanking away as though it had bit him, and the screeching stops. In its place is the muted growling rumble Thor normally associates with engines.

"I still do not believe this to be a good idea," he says, but knows when he looks over that it is a pointless protest. A look of grim determination has settled over the Midgardian's face. Thor has seen this before, in himself most often; the harder it is to do, the more he wants it done.

"Gear shift," he says, instead of responding to Thor's words, and pats the odd black stick between them. "This is an automatic, thank God, so all you have to do is shift from park to drive. See the pedals at your feet?"

"No," Thor replies, completely honest.

"There's two. Left one is the brake, right is the gas. Only use your right foot to push them, and never at the same time."

"Only one foot?" Thor asks. He pushes himself back in the seat, attempting to peer around under the wheel. "Why?"

Steve looks at him, that determination replaced by brief confusion. "Why?" he echoes.

"I have two feet, there are two pedals," Thor says, pointing out what seems to him to be too much a coincidence.

"One foot," Steve says firmly. Thor understands tradition for tradition's sake, and the sacrifice of efficiency, and so says nothing else on the matter. He puts his right foot on the left pedal, awkward though it may be, and pushes down firmly, then puts his hand on the gear shift and pauses.

"That one?" he asks, tapping a finger against one of the symbols along the shift track. It says only 'D'.

"Yup. Then take your foot off the brake-"

Thor shifts to the 'D' and moves his foot to the gas pedal.

"-and put on the gas-"

He pushes as firmly on the gas as he had on the brake.

"-gently, _gently_-!"

And the vehicle explodes into motion like a furious stallion.

When it all goes still again, several minutes later, Thor is laughing. Steve is not.

"Ah, my friend," Thor says, reaching over to clap the other man on the shoulder, "truly I have underestimated these 'vehicles' of yours. Now I see why the man of iron so enjoys driving."

Steve reaches around over his right shoulder and pulls forth the seat harness. It seems a puny thing, hardly capable of keeping a person safe, but he clicks it into place and pulls it tight. He does this with his left hand, his right still gripping, white-knuckled, at the handle over the window.

"All right," he says eventually. "We've learned donuts, fishtailing, curb jumping, scaring the hell out of the passenger, and about seven other highly illegal things. Now that all that is out of the way, can we focus on actual driving?"

Thor calms himself, trying for a composed tone, rather than gleeful like a child that has just learned a fun new game, a game that is fun only in how much it scares the adults. "I apologize. I did not intend to alarm you." He doesn't say that he was in complete control the whole time, doubts Steve will appreciate it even if he believes it.

"You see that half-circle, on the left? See the numbers?" Steve points at the display beyond the wheel. "That's the speedometer. Tells you how fast you're going."

"As compared to what?" Thor asks. He sees the numbers, but nowhere does it say what measurement of speed is used.

"Doesn't matter. If it goes above thirty again, you and I are going to have problems." His tone leaves little question as to what sort of _problems_ they would have and that, Asgardian or no, Thor will most likely lose when they go to discuss these _problems_.

"Very well," Thor agrees. He releases the brake and gently applies the gas and drives sedately forward.

"And Stark wanted to send us out here with a Corvette," the captain mutters under his breath. Thor doesn't ask, but he does remember. For later.

* * *

The mansion welcomes him back in its cultured voice, as it always does. Thor turns towards his quarters, then stops and turns back when he sees a light that should not be on at this time of night. He finds Clint sitting at the kitchen counter, a bowl of the glorious substance the humans call I Scream before him.

"Hey, Thor," the hawk greets him, pulling the bowl protectively close when Thor watches it a little too long. "How was the driving lesson?"

"It went well," Thor says, moving past him and into the kitchen. The others had stopped trying to explain acceptable portion sizes of I Scream to him and simply started buying the smaller containers for him. He picks out the one known as 'Chubby Hubby' and settles at the counter across from Clint.

"Glad one of you thinks that," Clint says dryly.

"He spoke to you?" Thor asks. He had moved slowly upon arriving at the mansion, allowing Steve some distance.

"Not exactly," the hawk says. "But he was muttering when he walked past, and he said something that sounds a lot like 'lunatic'."

"I quite enjoyed it," Thor says.

"Lunatics often do," Clint agrees solemnly. He waves away the question before Thor can even ask.

"Tell me," he says instead. "What is a Corvette?"

Clint looks up at him, eyes filled first with confusion, then a dawning horror, and he says very simply, "No."

Thor merely smiles.


End file.
